Zenfull Heart | September 18, 2026
Tonight was not really about a Free Hugs sign. It was about that small space between wanting to become someone and choosing to be her.
I went to Gallery Night in Pensacola tonight without knowing what I was walking into. I had heard about it and knew they closed down some of the streets and had vendors, music, performers and people everywhere, but I did not know the layout or the energy of it. I had my Free Hugs sign in the SUV with me, but I left it behind because I figured I would walk around first, get a feel for everything and decide whether it even felt like the right place to bring it out.
I was somewhere unfamiliar, I was alone, and I was simply taking in the environment before deciding what I wanted to do. As I walked around, I came across an area where Mexican music was playing. There were lights, people dancing and a man singing, and something about that space immediately pulled me in. Part of it was because it reminded me of Mexico. I could picture myself standing there with my sign high in the air. I had this knowing inside my SOUL that said this could be the place.
The only problem was that my SUV was quite a distance away, and that would have been such an easy excuse. I could have told myself I would keep walking around, enjoy the night and bring the sign another time. Instead, I turned around and walked all the way back to my car. That might sound ridiculously small compared to some of the things I have done over the last couple of years. I have traveled solo, walked into places and spaces where I did not know anyone, gone to retreats, lived in unfamiliar places and stood in many towns in Mexico holding my Free Hugs sign while complete strangers walked into my arms. I have been building Zenfull Heart from pieces of my own healing and slowly letting the world see more of who I am now. But there are still moments when something as simple as walking back to my SUV for my sign can feel like another mountain I am being asked to climb.
I think healing and growth are funny like that. You can completely change huge parts of your life and still find yourself standing at another doorway wondering if you are really going to walk through it. Apparently, tonight I was. I got the sign, walked all the way back and then stood there for what felt like forever trying to convince myself to actually do something with it.
This was the real lesson for me; I wanted to hold the sign up. I knew why I had gone all the way back for it. Nobody forced me to get it, and nobody even knew I had it. I could have walked away and nobody else would have known the difference, but I would have. The singer was mostly singing in Spanish, and since I do not speak Spanish, I did not know what the songs were about. I became hesitant because I did not want to step into the middle of something without understanding what was happening. Then he started singing “Stand By Me” in English, and I thought, okay, this would be the perfect time.
Still, I hesitated when he sang Stand By Me. There were people dancing in front of me and everyone seemed caught up in their own experience, and I could feel that familiar instinct to make myself a little smaller. Not completely disappear, but stay on the edge, observe everything and let everybody else be the ones who were being seen. I know that version of myself very well. She has gotten me through a lot, but I also know I do not want her making every decision for me anymore.
Earlier in the day, I had been listening to Dr. Joe Dispenza and thinking about something I have heard in many different forms throughout this work. If I keep making the same choices from the same familiar version of myself, why would I expect my life to become something different?
I keep saying I want more connection in my life. I want to spread kindness. I want to build Zenfull Heart to be something I live and not simply something I create. I want to be more visible, more open and more willing to bring love and connection into the world without waiting for somebody else to go first. At some point, life seems to answer those desires by putting an opportunity right in front of us and saying, okay, here you go. Apparently, my opportunity tonight was standing beside a porta potty in downtown Pensacola trying to convince myself to hold up my giant Free Hugs sign.
There is something wonderfully unglamorous about that when you really think about it. We talk about transformation in these beautiful, spiritual ways. We talk about creating a new reality, changing our energy, stepping into the unknown and becoming the future version of ourselves. Then sometimes the actual experience looks nothing like that. Sometimes it is just you standing somewhere uncomfortable, arguing with yourself about whether you are finally going to do the thing you already know you want to do.
Eventually, I uncovered the sign, stuffed the sheet into my backpack and leaned the sign up against the back of the porta potty still unnoticed. The words on it say Free Hugs in English and Abrazos Gratis in Spanish. I still stood there trying to work up the courage to actually hold it up.
Then the singer announced that he was doing his last song, and suddenly the moment became very simple. Either I was going to do it or walk away knowing I had carried that sign all the way back and never allowed myself to be seen with it. I remember telling myself, come on, Sherry. You can do this. So I picked up my sign and lifted it over my head as I walked into the circle and hugged the singer first. The singer read the words on my sign “Abrazos Gratis” a couple of times, and hearing those Spanish words brought something up in me because of how much I miss Mexico.
I do not mean that in a way that needs to become America versus Mexico, because that is not what this is about. I simply miss the culture and the connection I experienced there. I miss the community, and how family oriented it is and how willing people were to lean into an experience even if they did not know me. I remember standing with that same kind of sign in many towns in Mexico and watching people walk toward me. They hugged me. Sometimes people actually lined up. There was an openness to it that is hard to explain unless you have experienced it.
I miss that.
Tonight felt different, but it was never supposed to feel the same. I am not in Mexico. Maybe this part of my soul journey is not about trying to recreate Mexico in Pensacola. Maybe it is about finding out whether I am willing to carry the woman I became there into places where the energy is different, I don’t feel as grounded and where I do not know how people are going to respond. That is probably the more uncomfortable part of it. It is easier to open when people around you are opening too.
The harder question is what happens when they do not. What happens when nobody lines up, people keep walking, or you suddenly feel exposed and wonder if you should lower the sign? Can I still be the woman I say I want to become when the environment does not immediately validate that version of me? That felt like the real question tonight.
I did lower the sign at times. I rested it against my legs and watched the people dancing. Part of me wished I had walked through all of Gallery Night holding it high and allowing myself to take up more space. I also wish I had explored more of the event because there were so many things happening that I never even got around to seeing. But I do not want to take a moment of courage and immediately turn it into another place where I was somehow not enough. That would defeat the entire purpose.
I want to push myself further next time without taking anything away from what I did tonight. I stayed through the discomfort long enough to finally hold up my Free Hugs sign and let people see me. That matters. I think one of the things I am learning is that growth does not have to become another opportunity to punish myself. I can look at tonight and admit that I wanted more from myself without turning that into criticism. I can recognize where I shrank and still be proud of the places where I expanded.
For a long time, I think I imagined transformation would eventually mean these uncomfortable moments would disappear. Maybe I would heal enough through meditation and soul healing that I would understand enough and love myself enough that one day I would become this woman who simply walked into every situation completely confident and fearless. I think I am becoming a woman who trusts herself enough to walk into the uncomfortable situation anyway. That feels much more real to me.
Zenfull Heart has never just been about shirts with soul messages, sayings, memes, coaching, pet-sitting or a website or my Hug Movement with Free Hugs. Those things are expressions of something much bigger that has been happening inside of me for a long time. For me, it is about choosing connection after knowing what disconnection feels like. It is choosing kindness after experiencing what life feels like without enough of it. It is choosing love without waiting for somebody else to give it to me first, and it is learning not to live as though I need to stay invisible to feel safe.
Tonight, I did not suddenly become some completely new version of myself. I practiced being the woman I am becoming, and that is what real change looks like. It is not always one gigantic moment where the old version of us disappears. Sometimes it is hundreds of ordinary moments where we notice ourselves reaching for what is familiar and decide to make a different choice.
Tonight, I made a different choice. It was not perfect, and it did not need to be.
